Correct me if I'm wrong but I suspect a lot of self-diagnosed cases of aphantasia are due to the ambiguity of language (specifically, English)... Qualia lost in translation.
I suspect nobody really sees something visually when thinking/imagining something, in a sober waking state (barring maybe a few rare exceptions or psychotic disorders). If you would see something superimposed on your visual field, with closed eyes or not, that would be called hallucinating.
For me, "seeing it in my mind's eye" is a different kind of "seeing": there is no visual input.
Example: imagine a tree. Where are the branches? Where are the roots? Where are the leaves? What color do the leaves have? Etc... You can answer these questions, right? The place where you find the answers is where the mind's eye is. I've yet to meet someone who actually sees the tree with the same visual clarity as if looking at an actual tree.
Dreaming is somewhere in between for me: it's usually visual, but not of the same visual quality as waking life, except when lucid. A lot of people don't remember their dreams, but that doesn't mean they don't have them. Ask yourself right after waking up in REM sleep (don't even open your eyes if you can): what just happened? What were you thinking?
I suspect that you may have some degree of aphantasia.
Visualizing something encumbers the same visual processing as sight does. Personally I have a hard time visualizing something and looking at something at the same time. I can only pay close attention to inside or outside, not both simultaneously. (Casual attention, like half-listening, is possible otherwise I'd be a terrible driver.)
To think of it another way: when you say "I've yet to meet someone who actually sees the tree with the same visual clarity as if looking at an actual tree," maybe you should ask some more. I can look at things, close my eyes, and continue studying them up to the limits of my memory and original attention.
Aphantasia seems to come in degrees, not a binary "have it"/"don't have it."
It's more like a second virtual desktop than superimposed; it takes up the same coordinates, but there's a clear distinction between "real" and "imagined" objects (unless I'm particularly tired, but that's closer to "hallucinating" than "visualising").
I used to be able to visualise things in positions relative to real objects, but at the moment I can only manage floating in the air, such that focusing on the position of imagined objects de-focuses the background, either relative to my field of view (so it moves when I move my head) or in a defined position in space (so it doesn't move when I move my head – though obviously this is limited by my ability to instinctively judge positions and distances, so it often doesn't quite work right when things are moving in complex ways, or I'm moving fast).
Have you always been able to do this, because you mention practising this skill? Also, does this only happen after focussing on something, or does it happen spontaneously when thinking? I imagine it would be pretty distracting if someone says for example, "don't think of scary thing X", and then the scary thing manifests visually for you because you are thinking about it.
That sounds about right. For me, "don't think of a pink elephant" results in the image of a pink elephant, though if I'm not concentrating on its location it's just… somewhere.
> Have you always been able to do this, because you mention practising this skill?
I think I've always been able to do it – but I haven't been doing it as much since I stopped playing with toys, going outside and generally doing activities where such a thing would be useful, so it's less instinctive.
The only time I've ever experienced anything like that I was trying psychedelic mushrooms for the one (and so far, only) time, and so it was literally a hallucination.
Me: There's no way everyone actually sees things and I made it 30 years without knowing.
Everyone else: Yeah I see things.
Me: but, like really see or just remember features?
Everyone else: <some variation of quality, but it was always described visually and everyone agreed it was basically like seeing>
I put "see" in quotes in my original comment simply because that is how everyone I spoke to described it; that it's clearly not physical vision, but it's also clearly a visual experience. I have absolutely zero visual experience when I close my eyes, and I never have, it is simply emptiness.
You seem to describe dreaming as if you experience that visually too, while not being able to do it while awake. It's worth noting that this is not uncommon for people with aphantasia, which is why it is the inability to _voluntarily_ invoke your minds eye. Many people can still dream visually, however I do not. I go to sleep and then simply wakeup with nothing but emptiness in between (not an experience of emptiness as time passes, but more like a time skip).
I can imagine something, but it's like rendering a layer with the opacity brought all the way down to 0, but my "mental computer" knows it's there and can tell its shape, color, all its features & details in 3D space... without seeing the actual visual image.
Dreaming on the other hand is usually multi-sensory and especially visual for me. Much like being awake or in a VR environment, but with internally generated input.
Have you spend time really consciously investigating your sleep? To the point of interrupting it with alarms etc..? I'm someone who's very interested in my dreams: for years, every night before sleep I wonder what I will dream, sometimes I get lucid during the dream, and when I awake my first instinct is to recall my dreams. I think this is why I dream so much. I wonder if the same thing applies to visualization and whether or not aphantasia is "curable" through consciously exercising visualization.
Of course I can imagine sheep jumping over a fence, even in vivid detail, but this imagining is not really seeing visually like in real life, not even like in a dream. As I said, I would describe seeing things that aren't there (with closed eyelids or not) as hallucinating. Perhaps not being able to do that at will is aphantasia, I don't know, but it would blow my mind if it were
More rarely I also get it with sounds and then it definitely does feel that the sound is originating externally to my mind
You’re right that these experiences are more like hallucinations but I think they are points on a spectrum rather than separate things
I had many arguments with my wife about how I did not have visual dreams and did not see anything when I close my eyes. When she says she sees stuff when she closes her eyes, I always assumed it was some sort of metaphor and it was usual for human beings not to see anything when their eyes are closed.
I think when I "visualize" something, not limited to math and code, I do not see anything per se. Mostly I think my thoughts are directed graphs whose nodes are concepts I have in memory.
May I ask how did you get a diagnosis? And did you learn anything of use thanks to this diagnosis?
There isn't a scientific diagnosis, it's more of a self observation kind of thing right now. The reason is that there has been very little research into it so far. You may notice that the wikipedia article is extremely short and most of the references are news articles, opinion pieces, and blog entries. Personally, I've found that the realization has offered slightly new ways of approaching life. It's fun to explain to people how I think and how that may differ from them. Nothing truly changed except perspective.
For reference, I also think mostly in directed graphs. I'm also able to roughly draw a shape in my head, but its very quickly erased and is hyperlocal, like trying to draw in the air with a sparkler.
There is a subreddit, r/aphantasia, but I've found that it's mostly a mix of curious gawkers and bitter people claiming that having it has somehow deprived them of essential life experiences.
There's the Vividness of Visual Imagery Quiz but that's self-administered and is a questionnaire.
I think I must have this too. E.g. if I close my eyes and try to visualise the face of someone that I hang out with every day, I can't do it.
If I try really hard, the best I can do is a flash of bits of some photographs I remember. It also starts to give me a headache. I think though, if I want to remember how something physically looks it helps to have my eyes open. Even then it's more like flashes than being able to actually see something.
Mostly when I "visualise" something e.g. the house where I live, I think in terms of how things are spatially connected to one another. It's more like a scene from the matrix - where what I'm remember are more the concepts of things and where they are spatially, rather than what things actually look like. This is pretty much also what happens when I'm coding - thinking in terms of concepts and how things are connected together spatially.
There are varying degrees of aphantasia. For context, I am completely unable to “see” anything in my mind. I do not dream either. If I close my eyes and think of something, nothing happens visually, though I can more easily remember things about whatever it is. I would describe it more as complete emptiness, instead of darkness (as darkness implies there is something there at all). I have been like this since I was born.
One thing that stood out to me in GPs comment was that programmers tend to visualize code to reason about it. I asked a bunch of my friends after finding out my minds eye is blind and they all said they do it at least sometimes, some of them do it constantly.
I obviously don’t, but I can say that I have a very good memory (in general, but also for code), and often find myself capable of context switching between related bits of code faster than many of my peers. I rarely reach for a diagram for explanation, however I do use them very regularly for documentation and explaining designs because I find other people seem to be able to process that format better.
I don’t know if my aphantasia contributes to any of this, these are just things I’ve noticed I’m good at. One thing I am terrible at, however, is design.
[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia